The House could vote Thursday morning on a compromise defense spending bill that would allow the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) to build a new low-yield nuclear warhead in fiscal 2019.
If the House approves the conference report for the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the Senate would have to follow suit before President Donald Trump could sign the measure into law. The Senate had yet to schedule a floor vote at deadline for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing. The bill overall authorizes more than $15 billion for the NNSA, including full funding for three nuclear-weapon life-extension programs and one major weapon-alteration program.
Rep. Joe Courtney (D-Conn.), an NDAA conferee, on Tuesday told Defense Daily the House could vote Thursday to approve the conference report just before members leave town for their month-long August recess.
Besides authorizing the low-yield warhead, a modified version of the existing W76 warhead appropriators in both chambers have already agreed to fund, the 2019 NDAA would essentially maintain a legal requirement that Congress authorize any Department of Energy design work on new or modified nuclear warheads beyond cursory planning.
The unified bill shot down a Senate-backed proposal to increase the NNSA’s independence from the secretary of energy. NDAA conferees essentially punted on reforming the governance of the U.S. nuclear security enterprise, saying Congress should wait until 2020 — a presidential election year — to tackle the issue. The conferees noted they expect the federally funded National Academy of Sciences and National Academy of Public Administration to finish a study on NNSA governance in 2020.
Also not making the cut in the compromise bill was language from Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) to prohibit the NNSA from closing or repurposing the unfinished Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility at the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C. The agency wants to turn the plutonium-disposal plant, years behind schedule and billions of dollars over budget, into a factory for fissile nuclear-warhead cores called plutonium pits. However, conferees authorized a $220 million 2019 appropriation, plus any funds “otherwise made available for such purposes for fiscal year 2019,” to continue building the plant.
The conference report also requires that the NNSA look into what would happen if the agency is not allowed to turn the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility into a pit plant.
